Seacliff , in the county of Waikouaiti, is a small country township situated on the sea coast, twenty-four miles north by rail from Dunedin. It is so named from being on a cliff by the sea, and the railway station is 327 feet above sea level. From the township and the hills at the back, a magnificent view of the Otago Heads and Blueskin Bay is obtainable. On the hillside, a little above the railway station, the Sea-cliff Lunatic Asylum stands, surrounded by beautifully laid out gardens. Dairy-farming is the chief occupation of the residents of the district, and there is a dairy factory close to the township. Seacliff has a natural curiosity in a large stalacfite cave, which is just above high-water mark, and is easily reached. The local railway station serves the purpose of a post, telegraph, and money order office. Seacliff has, also, a public school, general store and hotel.

The Seacliff Hotel is situated near the railway station in the heart of the sylvan district of Seacliff, and at a distance of about twenty-four miles north by rail from Dunedin. It is a favourite resort for tourists, sportsmen, and pleasure seekers of every kind, a popular halting place for commercial travellers, and is in every way worthy of the large partonage accorded to it. The surrounding country is almost unexcelled in its scenic beauty. The hotel is within half a mile of the sea-shore, it stands at a considerable bright about sea level, and, therefore, the atmosphere is at once mild and bracing. On account of the abundant foliage close at hand, and the creepers on its own outer walls and over the door-way, the hotel has the appearance of a well-kept private residence. It is a wooden building of two stories, and contains about twenty rooms. The ground floor is devoted to private sitting-rooms, the dining room, the kitchen and the bar; and the first floor contains about ten bedrooms, arranged and furnished to accommodate small family parties, married couples, and individual lodgers. The whole place is well furnished, and is a model of cleanliness and good management. Experienced assistants help the proprietor, who personally supervises all the arrangements, and the table is supplied with elegance and abundance.

Mr. Frank Toomey , Proprietor of the Seacliff Hotel, was born at Adare, in County Limerick, Ireland, in 1877. He was educated in the Christian Brothers' School, and at the Training College for teachers, and subsequently held an appointment in the Industrial School at Killbegs, County Donegal. In 1893, however, he sailed for South Africa, where, at Capetown, he entered the Government service as a member of the police force. There he remained two years, and then came on to New Zealand. For two years after his arrival in Dunedin he assisted his brother, then licensee of the Shades Hotel, in Dowling Street, and in June, 1903, he took over the Seacliff Hotel.

Guy, photo.
Breaksea Sound.

Mr. William Guild , sometime of Seacliff, was born in Kirriemuir, Forfarshire, Scotland, in 1839, and came to Port Chalmers in the ship “Resolute,” on her first voyage, in March, 1864. After working as a gardener for Mr. Beverley, of Dunedin, for six years, he settled on a forty-acre farm at Seacliff, where, besides dairying, he carried on bee culture, and had as many as thirty colonies of those busy and profitable workers. Mr. Guild married a daughter of Mr. T. Smith, an old settler, and had five sons and four daughters. He died in December, 1902.

The late Mr. W. Guild.